Quality Time

What keeps you from being fully present in the moment? For me, it’s my phone. I live a lot of my life in front of a screen, emailing, writing, engaging on social media. So, like many millennials, I’ve gotten into the habit of scrolling on my phone. It’s not on purpose, most of the time. I’ll be watching TV, or finishing up dinner and someone says, “Did you hear what I just said?”

I realize in that moment I’m staring at a screen, scrolling. Mindless. No notification, no urgent email. Just… habit. Wasting time. It’s bad enough when I’m alone – I could be curled up with a good book or focused on my work. But when I’m with other people, it’s a huge problem. Because what I’m communicating to my wife, my housemates, my friends is that whatever’s on my screen is less important than who’s in the room with me.

And that’s just never true.

Now, I don’t want to talk about technology today (or at least not just about screens). I want to talk about being present. So again, the question: What keeps you from being fully present in the moment? When you’re with your spouse or your kids, what pulls you away? When a conversation with a neighbor or co-worker has the opportunity to push below the surface into some real stuff, what keeps you buoyed to the surface?

Maybe, like me, it’s a screen. But it could be busyness – maybe you get so caught up in doing stuff you forget the people you’re doing it for. Or maybe it’s a hobby or a travel schedule or a habit. I want you to ask that question of yourself today: what keeps me from having quality time with the people God has put in my life?

God calls us to be present, to be mindful of how we use our time. God gives us all the same 24 hours in a day.

What happens when we take seriously how we invest those hours in the relationships God has given us.

Join us Sunday as we learn how to create spaces for our relationships to be quality, not just quantity.